Relationships between stand spatial structure characteristics and influencing factors of bamboo and broad-leaved mixed forest

Abstract

ABSTRACTMoso bamboo is an economically valuable plant in southern China and bamboo and broad-leaved mixed forest is a better management model. The relationships between stand spatial structure characteristics and factors influencing (e.g., salt, soil, and terrain factors) bamboo and broad-leaved forest in the Nature Reserve of Tianbaoyan (Yongan city, Fujian provice), China, were investigated using canonical correspondence analysis (CCA). The results showed that the horizontal distribution of bamboo and broad-leaved forest was mainly randomly distributed, that the states of tree growth were at the doctrine of mean as a whole, and the degree of mixing by species was low. The first CCA axis accounted for slope position, soil organic carbon, crown ratio, bamboo density, broad-leaf tree density, soil water content, and C/N, while the second CCA axis showed variation due to altitude level, average diameter of broad-leaf tree, soil total nitrogen, and soil total phosphorus. In general, both axes reflected the response of forest spatial structure to changes in the water thermal gradient and the relationship between forest complexity and changing soil physio-chemical properties. Furthermore, the variation in stand spatial structure of bamboo and broad-leaved mixed forest explained by stand, soil, and terrain factors reached 100%. When broken down, interacting stand and soil factors together accounted for up to 67.3%, stand factors alone for 20.3%, and soil factors alone for 1.7%, while interactions among all three explained 9.69% of the stand spatial structure; terrain factors alone and their interaction with other factors had negligible explanatory power (0.09–0.21%).